Family Jewels
by NaomiP
Summary: A sweet and angsty stand alone. Related to Into the Light, but can be read on its own. I tell you inside what you need to know. Luka and Susan in an angsty moment. 'Your wedding ring.' 'Yeah. I took it off ten years ago.'


[Ok. So this is just a fragment. And it's actually set _during_ "Into the Light." But since it occurs, timewise, within a chapter, I couldn't just add it to that one, inserted as a separate chapter. While I could have edited the relevant chapter ... no-one would have known it was there and gone to look. And it works ok as a little stand-alone, I think.  
  
It came to me a few days ago, and I kick myself for not thinking of it when I was actually writing the thing.  
  
If you haven't read ITL, or if it's been a while, here's what you need to know to make sense of it: Luka is dying. (Terminally ill ... what's wrong with him isn't relevant here. Go read ITL if you want to find out.) He's been with Susan for a year, (since just after his disease was diagnosed), but they didn't marry. He wouldn't marry her because he doesn't want to leave her a widow ("I've been there, Susan. It isn't a role I recommend.") Things are getting down to the wire here. Susan is caring for him at home, as he had wished.   
  
And all the usual nonownership disclaimers regarding ER and its characters apply here.  
  
---------------  
  
Luka's voice was very hoarse now. "Susan?"   
  
"Yeah." She smiled a little. "I'm the only other person in the room, you know."  
  
"In my dresser ... top drawer. There's a box."  
  
Susan opened the drawer. "The black one?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
Susan lifted out the small black leather box. Embossed with a pattern of vines and leaves. She'd seen it before, quite often. His jewelry box. Luka had told he'd bought it in Italy years ago. She handed it to him and he opened it.  
  
A velvet tray, separated into sections. Each small square held an item of jewelry -- such jewelry as men tended to wear. Tie tacks, cuff links, a gold chain he wore on rare occasions. Luka tried to grasp the little satin tab that would lift up the tray. But he was too weak, too clumsy.  
  
"I can do that," Susan said. And she lifted the tray. A single, larger compartment underneath. Another chain, this one with a small silver filigree cross on it. Rather tarnished. A ring, a woman's ring set with a purple stone shaped like a heart. And a plain gold band; broad, for a man. "Pretty," she said softly.   
  
"Cross belonged to my mother. She got it from her mother. It's been in the family for over one hundred years." He shrugged and smiled a little. "I don't have any sisters, so I ended up with it. Maybe a subtle hint from her that I should have married again ... had another daughter. You'll send it to Tata?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"It can go to a female cousin or something. And there's a list ... on my desk, of some other stuff I want him to have. Mostly little things." A smile. "He gets the money. You get most of the crap."  
  
Not hardly, Susan thought. Luka didn't own 'crap.' He didn't own much, had rarely spent money on 'stuff' even when he'd had the money to spend on it. But what he did own was top quality. Italian suits and shoes, Calphalon pans, Waterford, leather furniture, Egyptian cotton bed sheets. And anyway, 'things;' the things that Luka had lived among and handled every day would always hold more memories for her than cash-in-the-bank ever could.  
  
"What's the ring?" Susan asked softly.   
  
"It was Dani's. Her engagement ring. I was broke. Couldn't afford a diamond. But she loved purple, so I saved for months until I could buy her an amethyst. She loved it."  
  
"It's beautiful." Susan picked it up. "She had tiny hands, didn't she?"  
  
"Yeah, she did. She was buried wearing her wedding ring, but I kept that one. Wore it on a chain around my neck for years."  
  
"What do you want to do with it now?"  
  
"I thought I'd send it home ... but if you like it ....."  
  
Susan laughed a little and shook her head. "It wouldn't fit me ... except maybe as a pinkie ring. Besides isn't that just a little ...."  
  
"Weird?" Luka finished for her.  
  
"Yeah. Weird."  
  
"Maybe. I was just thinking if you liked it as a piece of jewelry ... But yeah, send it to Tata. Dani's parents are gone, but she had three sisters. He can send it to one of them."   
  
And the gold band. Luka picked it up, held it on his palm for a moment.  
  
"Your wedding ring?" A rhetorical question, of course.  
  
"Yeah. I took it off ten years ago." His fist closed around it. "Will you see that I'm ... wearing it?"  
  
"Yes, Of course." But Susan couldn't hide the pain in her voice, in her face. A pain that Luka understood. Not the pain of losing him, but the pain that she had never really had him. That there had always been _someone_ else in the room.  
  
"God ... Susan ... I'm sorry. I hate this. I hate doing this to you. I've _never_ wanted to hurt you. I love you so much. This past year ... I've been so happy. I know it didn't always look that way, but I have been. I'm so glad I found you ... so glad _you_ didn't give up on me ... that I could have a little happiness ... for the first time in 13 years ... before I have to go. I just wish my happiness didn't have to hurt you."  
  
Susan bit her lip. "I knew what I was getting into, sweetheart. With all of this ... and with Danijela too. You had something wonderful with her ... and I'm thrilled that you had it. Most people go through their whole lives never having something like that, and I'm not going to be sorry that you did. And even if it meant you were never ... 100% mine ... I'm still glad for what _we_ did have. Wouldn't have missed a minute of it. Not for anything."  
  
Susan folded her hand over Luka's closed fist. His hand was so thin, and the nails were splitting, but it was a little puffy now. Edema. His kidneys were shutting down. "You can ... put it on now if you want to."   
  
Luka opened his hand again, looked at the ring, then at her, and shook his head. "No. Not right now. Dani ... can wait a little longer for me. Right now ... I am ... still yours. 100%." He put the ring on the bedside table and closed the box, handed it to Susan. "I'm tired."  
  
He shut his eyes. And Susan lay down beside him and held him while he slept. 


End file.
